Ex British Serviceman Accused of Murdering Kenyan Woman Shows Up in Court

A man has been presented in court as extradition hearings started in the case of Agnes Wanjiru, a Kenyan national, a woman of Kenyan origin who was murdered near a UK military installation in 2012.

The accused Robert Purkiss, 38 years old, who is hailing from the Manchester area, showed up in the magistrates' court in Westminster on Friday, and informed the court he would challenge the extradition. It is understood that he was taken into custody on Thursday night.

A detention order for the suspect was issued by a court in Nairobi in September. The state attorneys stated before the Kenyan court that the individual had been accused of a sole charge, of killing, and that the Kenyan government would request his deportation to stand trial.

Purkiss served formerly as a medical attendant with the Duke of Lancaster’s Regiment, the military regiment for the north-west of England, including on deployments in Afghanistan.

Wanjiru, twenty-one, a hairdresser who had a baby daughter, vanished after a evening out, and her corpse was found two months later in the grounds of the hotel where she had previously spotted.

Not a single person had earlier been taken into custody or accused in association with her demise. His detention came after a recent detective probe, which was initiated after a exposé in the year 2021 by the Sunday Times, in which the newspaper contacted several serving and ex-military personnel in the regiment.

The probe has been spearheaded by detectives in Kenya, which, under a mutual defense pact, retains jurisdiction in the case.